


It'll be Cultural

by Saxifactumterritum



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Fluff, M/M, everyday situations pegasus version, kinda domestic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-31
Updated: 2019-10-31
Packaged: 2021-01-15 01:36:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21245366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saxifactumterritum/pseuds/Saxifactumterritum
Summary: A freezing planet, a couple of persuasive people, and John's not fighting too hard; he likes this whole lights festival idea. So long as no one's setting fire to his city.





	It'll be Cultural

**Author's Note:**

> on Tumblr an absolute age ago ami-ven made the awesome prompt 'Hey, this is for your prompt request: The expedition is international, right? How about something about someone from one of the other countries? Maybe a holiday or food the Americans (and Canadians) don't understand?'. However, I do not know any cultural things, I couldn't really think of anything I've experienced that might hit that button and I didn't want to try and explain some other culture's stuff, so. Here we go.

I

MK3-000 is a strange, empty planet. There are people who live there but they live on the other side of the planet, there are only about three hundred of them, and they only live on MK3-000 for three months per year. Years here are closer to fourteen earth-months. Teyla names it Planet of the Moon because the moon is so close and so big, and she hates it. It’s always dark, it’s always cold, it’s always winter. Ronon calls it ‘Narnia’, his current mission being to drop earth based cultural allusions into conversation and watch to see if anyone dares ask how he knows. 

“We’re here for four weeks,” John says, in reply to the surly grumbling around him as they gather this side of the gate. “Just put up with it, ok?”

They’re stuck here for four weeks because: a. the gate only dials-out when there’s a thaw, and the weather cycles are shitty but predictable - no thaw for four weeks just ice, ice, snow, more ice; b. They had to come back through after being stuck here a week on their scout because there is an Ancient outpost here that used to manufacture jumpers and Zelenka wants an inventory plus any spare parts plus anything made of a specific type of metal; and c. they have links with a bunch of worlds that exist at least partially at sub-zero climes and John recently found out that he has a bunch of marines who’ve never done any cold weather training. 

“This is great,” sergeant major Holt says, beaming around, clapping her gloved-hands together. “Really great find, sir, I can do a lot with this.”

She’s here to train the marines. Rodney pushes past her and just  _ glowers _ , radiating bad temper, six of Zelenka’s guys are huddled nearby. John takes a look around at the rag-tag bunch they’ve got and sighs. 

“Holt, we’ll get to the fun part of the month soon enough. If you could fall everyone in, we’ll get moving toward the installation. You’re experienced in this kind of terrain so you’ll take point with Ronon, who knows where we’re going. Good with you, Ronon?” John calls the last across to where Ronon’s playing some kind of knuckle cracking game with one of the corporals. He lopes over. 

John takes the six with Teyla, and Rodney joins them in order to grumble, leaving his gaggle of scientists to stumble along with the marines, who are singing Christmas songs at the tops of their lungs at Holt’s suggestion. Not anything to do with cold weather training, she just loves Christmas songs. John pulls the hood up on his coat and wishes he ran hotter. He’s already cold. He’s done this training twice,  _ he  _ isn’t one of Zelenka’s staff, he doesn’t need to be here. His team got volunteered for it, though, because both he and Rodney have experience in cold climates, Ronon is good everywhere, and Teyla because she had the bad luck to be on a team with people who got sent to freezing places. 

“I do not like the cold,” Teyla growls. 

“I know,” John says. “And Rodney, I know you think Radek should do this himself, but he has the flu, it’s not exactly plausible that Richard’d send him out here and even if he did, Dr Gush would nay-say it.”

“I would indeed,” Dr Gush calls back cheerfully. 

He’s come along for  _ fun _ . He thinks it’s a good opportunity to learn something new, expand his horizons, broaden his training. He took over for Dr Keller when they left earth, he’s worked at the SGC running the night shift for years and worked for MSF and John’s pretty sure he has the widest experience and training possible, and yet here he is. John trudges along, trying to keep a watch through the light snow-fall that seems almost constant here, and listens to Rodney and Dr Gush argue about whether or not Zelenka was well enough to come on this mission. 

The landscape is all whites, greys, blues, and blacks under the cold moon and stars, as they walk through the snow and ice John’s glad they have proper cold weather clothing. Some is bits of uniforms pieced together from what was brought, some is Athosian quilting underneath, some is from various trades; sergeant Miles Ladipo has boots made from what John is sure are dragons’ scales. The moon drifts a little to the left, and the light-level rises a tiny bit. This counts as sunrise, John knows, and now they enter into the first day. Nothing but snow as far as he can see. They get to the top of a slope and follow a path down the other side, looping around a smaller hill, following it down into a valley that’s all ice. It’s beautiful, water cascading frozen over the crest, falling jagged into soft snow drifts. Eerie patches of glassy ice reflect light in odd patterns, chasing them as they march on. 

“Where I grew up we had this lights festival every year,” lieutenant Yamato says, wistfully. “Fucking weird as hell, they’d tell you the date but it wasn’t ever clear where exactly it was, so you’d just have to rush around the city, and you’d bump into other groups and exchange the ritual greeting.”

“Ritual greeting, sounds bad,” Rodney says. 

“It was ‘have you seen it yet?’” Yamato says, laughing. “Or ‘are you looking for it? Have you seen it?’. And then, my Dad always would just plant himself eventually. He’d say ‘they put Radcliffe square, so they’ll come here at some point’. Hertford College usually did carols and hot punch, so we’d get punch and wait, and wait, and then there’d be a burst of sound and they’d  _ come _ .”

“Uh huh,” Rodney says, trying to sound unimpressed, but they’re all listening now. 

“Rising up like they were growing right out of the cobbles, clashing music and people singing and lanterns, paper lanterns like they were swimming through the air, monsters and patterns and the rabbit from Alice in Wonderland, bobbing along, the strange procession, and I never did find out who these people were or how you ended up in the lantern march.”

As Yamato talks about the procession rising up, they reach the edge of a wide, white plain, lit by the moon as it sinks a little more, light softening. At the far horizon they see it, just like last time; a spire pushing up out of the snow, decked out with ice. They stand still as Yamato’s voice fades away, gazing. 

“Let’s keep moving,” John says. The snow starts to fall harder. “Dr McKay’ll get the heating up and running when we arrive, we can get warm. It’s a straight line.”

There’s a collective groan, an outraged harrumph from Rodney, but then Ronon says they’ll get fed when they arrive and that galvanizes people into moving. Holt sets a brisk pace across the open space, the wind picking up and carrying people’s words away, everyone cold and damp and miserable. The spire necessitates torches again, the shadow it casts dark. Daytime is actually darker, John’s sure. Softer, gentler, and darker. The doors to the installation are set high above the ground, in deference to snowfall, and they all have to climb eroded, icy steps, no Ancient version of non-slip surfacing. They throw down salt as they go and everyone has grips on their boots; no one falls. Rodney bustles up double-time to get to the doors first. Dr Corrigan could probably open them fine, but Rodney’s adamant he must do it. Incidentally, he gets in out of the wind first. 

John traipses in last, stamping the snow off his boots, looking around the echoey passage that’s just as he remembers. It curves around the spire to steps, no transports here. Rodney’s already hustling, talking as he goes, data-pad in hand. He’s bickering with Dr Corrigan about the heating. John sighs, checks that they’re really alone with the LSD, then shuts the door on the inhospitable planet, closing them in the empty dimness of the inhospitable building. The beams of P90s and torches turns the whole place uncanny and strange, their steps echo as they walk, heading for the stairs. The walls fall away as they step out and start to climb upwards, they can look down toward the skylights and roofs below, or up and across to the next loop of stairs. This section of the spire is empty in the center, just stairs. All very weird. 

“The lights festival didn’t seem to align right with any religious thing,” Yamato says, resuming his rambling from earlier. “It always reminded me of this mindless droning song we had to sing at school; winter is dark, yet each tiny spark, brightens the way to Christmas day.”

He sings the last bit, sure enough it’s slow and droning. John nods, directing his torch beam towards the nooks and crannies and corners, keeping an eye out for bugs. 

“I used to think it was a spell against winter, hold back the cold,” Yamato says. “It was something to do with the solstice I guess, maybe.”

“Where did you grow up?” Rodney asks, sounding genuinely curious. 

“Oxford. Well, all over the place, Dad was in the army for the first six years of my life and we moved around a lot, but Oxford mainly. Mum was an academic, she studied maths,” Yamato says. “Anway, the lights festival was great. We should have one on Atlantis.”

“A lantern parade?” John asks. “Is that… it’s just lanterns?”

“Sure, like I say I have no idea who made them or was involved, I think community groups? Paper lanterns, papier mache, the rabbit hung in the Covered Market the rest of the year. People made incredible things, it was great. Really cheered up the sunless time of year,” Yamato says. 

“Four weeks is a long time without sun,” Ladipo intones, from somewhere up ahead. 

“We brought some fancy lamps,” John says. “Fake sun.”

“A bunch of lanterns sure would be good fake sun,” Ladipo says. 

“We didn’t bring paper,” John says. 

“When we get home, then. To look forward to,” Ladipo says. 

“It’s cultural,” Ronon calls down.

“Yeah, it’s cultural like the cheese rolling was cultural,” John grumbles.

Ronon persuaded him that Corporal Miranda Little had some great cultural thing and that participating would help the marines reach a better understanding, and be better at cross-cultural sensitivity, and John fell for it and ending up running head first down a hill after a wheel of cheese.

“Just cus you lost!” Ronon shouts down, way ahead now. “That was some good cheese.”

“Ya’ll’ll just set fire to stuff,” John says. 

He can hear Ronon laughing, which is probably a confirmation. John and Teyla trudge along at the back, not catching the good cheer. Teyla probably because of the cold and John because, well, he’s stuck on an alien planet with no sun, and his role here is effectively babysitting. Making sure no scientists wander off or get in danger, making sure the training Holt’s running is fit to purpose for Pegasus fuckery, making sure no one freezes to death in the ice. He plans out work rosters for the men as he climbs, assigning KP based on whoever it is that’s laughing that hard at the joke Ronon just made that he’s sure is at his expense. 

The main thing about MK3-000 is that every day for two to three minutes, the sun rises. The first day it doesn’t feel like a big thing. Rodney’s still trying to get the heating working, Holt’s still supervising camp set up, Ronon’s still eating; getting everyone up and out into the cold in order to see the sun is difficult. John does it by shouting, trying to channel a drill sergeant he had in basic. And then by threatening Rodney and Teyla that he’ll roster their team for every mission out to this ice planet unless they put their damned outerwear on and get moving. So neither of them speak to him for the whole ten minute ordeal of seeing the sun. The second day it’s a little easier to get people out, and the third day when he calls a halt to proceedings (still just trying to establish a solid base camp to work out of and get some heat going), everyone is almost eager. 

Lunch time later that day, John’s perched high up the machinery that used to construct his jumpers but now is just useless. Set up has reached a natural pause, the heating’s finally running right, no one’s working right now, an unspoken agreement to take a long break reached without consultation or remark. There are people lounging on sleeping bags playing cards, Rodney’s hunched over his ipad, the special daylight lamps are all on. John’s poking at an MRE and keeping watch on the position of the moon through the narrow windows in the spire up here. Gush clambers up to join him, balancing precariously to walk across a beam, light on his feet and making it look easy. 

“How’re they doing?” John asks, nodding down to the huddles of men and women. 

“Coping, so far,” Gush says. He’s not really just here to do the training, though he could have (arguably  _ should  _ have) sent one of his people. Four weeks without sun is a long time. “The lights help, and your ritual of catching the sun-spot is entertaining them. I’m giving out some vitamin D supplements, and some sleep aids.”

John nods, grunts acknowledgement, watches Ronon gather a group to go running. He calls down that it’s nearly time to get their sun and Ronon waves to show he heard, starting a warm-up all the same. Rodney looks up too, at the noise, and John looks away, pretending interest in his food. People begin to stir, preparing to get their outer layers on. It is a ritual, John realises as he climbs down to join them, Gush swinging down gracefully behind him. They dress in silence and go down the stairs without a word, gathering on the steps out the front, all of them lifting their faces to the light as the sun rises it’s bare few inches and breaks through the flurries of snow, lighting up the world, darkening the shadows to welcoming softness. 

Someone starts a tally, counting down the days as they turn into a week, ticking onwards. John gets a report from Holt about the training and goes out with them for the day, to assess better. Holt’s too experienced to be unnerved by having a superior officer along but some of the men are less so. Corporal Jamison especially freezes up a lot under John’s scrutiny, red-faced and frustrated. He’s angry about it, too young for it not to matter to him. It shows, the lack of sun is too pronounced it shows off all the strain on them, the white light of the moon making everything feel stark and on display. Jamison lasts two more days before he shouts at John, trying to start a fight. It trickles through, souring them all, especially when Jamison refuses to come out for the sun spot. 

“We need a lights festival, is what we need,” Yamato says, standing at John’s shoulder. He adds a belated “sir.”

“Bit of culture,” Ronon adds. 

Yamato gets annoyed at Ronon for making it into a joke and John decides that enough is enough. He sends everyone off in groups of two or three to explore the lower areas of the spire, separating people for a little while. He lets his team sit this one out, and for a blissful couple of hours it’s just the four of them, shut in at the top in the warmth, keeping company. It cheers Teyla up to be able to relax and she talks Ronon into meditating, probably with blackmail. Rodney climbs up to where John’s perched again. 

“Two more weeks, just over,” Rodney says, settling beside John. 

“You’re sure there’s no way to dial any earlier?” John asks. 

“No, of course I'm not sure, this is Pegasus. Did you want to go out in the snow and freeze half to death to try and fix the DHD to work when we’re pretty sure it won’t?” Rodney asks. 

“No,” John admits. “Think we might need a new strategy, though.”

“You could always let them have their lantern parade,” Rodney says. 

“Back on Atlantis, I probably will,” John admits, and Rodney huffs a laugh, nudging his shoulder. John frowns. The contact feels good, being close to someone feels good. He can’t really mandate hugging, though. He puts an experimental arm around Rodney’s shoulders and squeezes. 

“What’re you doing?” Rodney asks, sighing, leaning into it. 

“It’s nice, right?” John checks. Rodney nods. “Can’t order my men to hug each other.”

“They’re doing cold weather training, John. This is pretty much the only context where you absolutely can do that,” Rodney says. 

“Point.”

So, John talks to Holt, and Holt laughs her ass off but agrees, and for the next few days the training ends with practising how to warm each other up if hypothermia should occur. The fact that the heating in the bit of installation they’ve set up camp works fine is never brought up. It is truly cold after being outside, and it is really good to share warmth, to just not be so alone in the stark light that never fully goes away. There’s no true encompassing darkness for night though also never any true light, and no warmth or sun for the day, save their two or three ritualistic minutes. Time passes and Jamison apologises and offers to do KP for the rest of their stay. 

Week three is a slog. The training’s over by day four, everything’s been gathered and loaded for transport from Zelenka’s lists, everyone just wants to go home and there is still no real sunlight. John and Ronon come up with challenges for the marines, and Teyla suggests putting the scientists in too and turning it into a teams thing which is a pretty good idea. Rodney adds some challenges that are less military and it’s almost fun for a bit, winning points for their teams, running around the installation playing what effectively is hide and seek one day, climbing ropes to a timer, breaking through doors with the help of the scientists. But it’s a slog. Time passes slowly, they have to force themselves out for the moments of sunshine, and Dr Gush is giving out sleep-aids like candy. The evening before the night that will usher in their final week, John takes something himself, waits for everything to settle, and sneaks into Rodney’s tent. They’ve set up tents inside, just in case the heating fails, and because it’s easier to camp than to try and set up rooms or work out where the Ancient’s slept. 

“Jesus, you scared the hell out of me, Colonel,” Rodney whispers, sitting bolt upright, hair sticking up. “What?”

“Shh,” John whispers, crawling up the mess of Rodney’s bedroll, dragging his sleeping bag. “Unzip yours.”

Rodney rolls his eyes, John can tell even in the dark, but does as requested so John can tuck himself in against Rodney’s warmth, can pull both their sleeping bags up around them. Rodney’s arms are warm, too. John hasn’t felt warm yet, since Atlantis. He sinks into this, breathing evening out. 

“Oh, Gush drugged you, huh?” Rodney asks, sounding amused. John realises he’s nuzzling, snuggling closer, trying to leech heat. 

“‘m’cold,” he mumbles. 

“Yeah, that’s my skin you have your ice-block feet against, I can tell,” Rodney says, voice low and soothing. “Fine, go to sleep, then, if you’re stealing my space and my warmth you might as well get rest out of the thievery.”

“You’re nonsensical,” John yawns, relaxing. God, it’s so good to be warm. 

Rodney hums agreement and tightens his hold, grumbling wordlessly until John gets his sleep-heavy arms around Rodney’s back and broad shoulders in return. They sleep knit together like that, breath hot against each other’s skin, and John actually sleeps solidly for hours. He’s woken early by Ronon coming to root him out before the others are up, dragging him off for a run. And so their final week begins. 

If week three was a slog, week four is like the last leg of a marathon for an unseasoned runner. Every moment it feels like pushing through a barrier. There’s no cheering people up anymore, there’s just time losing meaning, their tiny bright spot of sunshine each day, the promise of sleep to speed things up. John makes sure they stick to a cycle of day and night, tries to make sure no one loses their shit, sends everyone on runs with Ronon including the scientists, and they all just hold on. Everyone talks about Yamato’s lights festival, passing it around like a talisman; John will hear ‘and the whole procession of ghosts just rising out of the street bringing light’, or ‘christ, hot punch, mulled wine’. 

John forces them all out into the snow to review Holt’s training, sends the scientist on a last scout for anything they’ve missed, and while everyone’s gone he unearths the bottle of Bornish crushed juice from his pack. It’s a kind of wine from the Bornlands, a set of planets who they don’t trade with anymore since they kidnapped and imprisoned Lorne and his team. It’s a shame, they make good crushed juice. It’s barely alcoholic, enough for it to count but not enough to get anyone drunk. Teyla brings certain things with her everywhere, and she is happy to share a bit of the spice she adds to tea sometimes, digging it out of her pack for him and giving him a soft look. He had to water it down a bit so there’ll be enough but it’s strong and rich and can take it. He and Teyla heat it, Rodney’s out with the scientists and Ronon’s out with Holt so it’s just him and Teyla, 

The wonder and delight on people’s faces when they return to warmed spiced wine isn’t anything John ever imagined cherishing, but he does. And afterwards people sit too close, sharing warmth, and tell stories quietly about other times in their lives they were cold, and then times when they were warm. Jamison tells them about sitting in his livingroom with his sisters as a teenager, roasting chestnuts, a few years after their mother died. Their father didn’t come in the livingroom much, so it was just them. Holt talks about going home after a long deployment, to her wife. DADT is in effect but John’s never enforced it and no one comments now. Ladipo talks about French beaches and beautiful women and sets everyone laughing. The tally shows two more days. It’s stopped snowing.

They leave the installation in silence, on the final day, John taking the lead this time with Ronon. They walk shoulder to shoulder, heads down, no one caring about the beauty of the scenery this time. It feels like a longer walk but halfway there, as they crest a hill, the sun breaks through cloud and everything is lit up. Everyone instinctively halts and lifts their faces, standing still for a moment before remembering; they don’t have to do this anymore. They’re going home to where there is sunshine for whole entire hours. John and Ronon increase the pace and the marines start a call, something rude and stupid and it sets them laughing so John doesn’t care. They can finally, finally see the gate. 

It’s a strange sensation, walking onto Atlantis; it’s the middle of the day there and light is streaming in. They huddle in the middle of the gateroom among their luggage, blinking, disorientated. John signals Dr Gush and they call a medical team to guide everyone through to the infirmary for checks. John takes Teyla up to Woolsey’s office for a quick debrief, to check on how things have been here, then he dismisses Teyla so she can see her son. He himself goes to get his checks and to hand in his weapon, and then he heads to Rodney’s quarters for a shower and to sleep for hopefully about a week. 

He’s sprawled on his front and working up a good doze when Rodney tumbles in, talking on the radio, thumping about and making a mess and loads of noise. He doesn’t even notice John until he tries to lie down, finds John’s sprawl of limbs in his way, and yelps. John shifts, slow and sleepy, and curls himself around Rodney, pulling him down and under the covers, humming and tangling them until it’s comfortable. The sun coming through the window feels good on his face, but Rodney’s familiar warmth is better. 

II

While Atlantis is civilian-lead and while many people have made it some kind of home, it’s mostly been similar to military installations John’s lived on in the past. Since their return to Pegasus, after what people have been calling the ‘Earth battle’, it’s shifted a bit. Now it’s sort of like college; there are fliers about music nights and poetry recitations and ‘come help us build a robot to destroy the robot those other guys built’ and advertisements for furniture, odd job ads for trade, posters for lost things. There are email lists for hobbies and a knitting club, various book clubs, so many movie nights. There are cooking classes and writing groups and lectures and seminars and so when John walks into the mess one day he just rolls his eyes at the tables laid out with craft things and makes his way to a nice corner to lurk in with his coffee and sandwich. It’s peaceful until sergeant Ladipo comes over with a crate and a grin the size of a continent. 

“Sergeant,” John says, giving him a lazy salute.

“Sir,” Ladipo says, straddling a chair and unpacking bits of wood, paper, glue, glitter, and spreading it over John’s nice empty, peaceful table. “We’re gonna do it. Yamato wrote up a proposal and Mr Woolsey said it sounded like a great idea, so we’re doing it!”

“What is ‘it’?” John asks, picking through the crafty things trying to sneak into his mug, gently nudging it aside. 

“The ghost lanterns! Well, Yamato swears it’s not ghosts but who the hell cares about corporeal parades?” Ladipo says, bending forward, focus intent on his project. 

“Uh huh,” John says, inching his chair back a little, hugging his coffee. 

Ladipo glances up and beams at him, it’s quite nice to see his men happy so John gives what must be a bewildered smile in return and lets the guy get on with it, skimming through some reports on a pad and sipping his coffee, paying half-attention as Ladipo builds a sturdy frame out of the wood, bending it gently to make rounder pieces. John’s radio beeps before whatever it is comes together. It’s an unscheduled check-in from a gate-team who were not supposed to be doing more than scouting but have somehow managed to cause an inter-galaxy incident of epic proportions. John almost enjoys the two weeks that follow because it’s nice that this? Is definitely not  _ his  _ fault. 

The second week he’s off-world with Teyla and a diplomatic team, slowly dying of boredom. There’s very little fighting, once they’ve freed their people from an imprisonment (the planetary leaders hadn’t sanctioned imprisoning anyone but mostly took the view that Atlantis could sort it out themselves and sat back to watch). John stays the week to be an obvious security presence, to draw attention away from the fact that 90% of the Atlantis diplomatic personnel are military, ex-military, or Pegasus equivalents and are an effective threat in their own right. He’s more than happy when the week draws to a satisfactory close and he can step back through the gate, his people reclaimed, the relevant feathers soothed. He’s surprised to see Rodney waiting for him. 

“Give me five minutes?” he asks Teyla, as Richard heads for them, a determined look on his face that forebodes long debriefings. Teyla nods and goes to cover for him. “Hey, McKay.”

“Yes, yes, fine,” Rodney says, catching his elbow and dragging him toward a corridor. “Did you know about this? Did you? I know I requested that my staff have an engineering background where possible but this is ridiculous! It is an unsanctioned use of their skills!”

“It’s cultural,” Ronon says, popping out of thin air to loom. John does not jump. Ronon grins. “Hey Sheppard.”

“Yes hello nice to see you is this your fault?!” Rodney says. 

“Probably not?” John says, squinting at the data-pad Rodney’s thrusting in his face. “What is it? Is that… is that R2D2? Cool.”

It’s a  _ lantern _ ,” Rodney says, imbuing the word with deep disgust. “And your marines have been stealing my people to help them make this work!”

“Huh,” John says, pushing Rodney’s pad away. “Cool. Ok. What?”

“The haunted walk,” Ronon says. 

“He’s the worst offender,” Rodney says, snatching at his tablet (from  _ himself _ , he’s the only one holding the damn thing), flicking and clicking and then shoving it at John again. “Look.”

This time it’s a wicker and paper construction, painted in earthy colours, with big eyes and ribbon-whiskers. It looks half-finished and John has no idea what animal it’s supposed to be. Ronon looks real pleased with himself. 

“Did you make that?” John asks. 

“Yep,” Ronon says. 

“Cool,” John says.

“No!” Rodney says. “He took good hours, hours that might have been used to fix the stupid problem we have in lab 8 with the ZPM project!”

“Rodney, it’s gonna happen, just go with the flow,” John says. Then he turns to Ronon and narrows his eyes. “Ronon, stop winding him up.”

Ronon shrugs, wandering off. He looks a bit deflated, like John’s just ruined his fun. Rodney rolls his eyes. 

“Like he was any good at it anyway,” Rodney says. “He thinks I care, but I don’t. It’s apparently called an ipeck and he had one as a pet. It’s got horns. I think it makes him feel connected to Sateda or some hooey.”

“You’re a sap,” John says, patting Rodney’s shoulder and giving in to the urge to kiss his slightly sweaty forehead, holding his arm. “Debriefing. Later?”

“Mm, ok, fine,” Rodney says. 

“When is this thing anyway?”

“Three days,” Rodney says. “I think Lorne’s made fireworks.”

“If they set fire to the city I’ll be pissed,” John says. 

He lets go of Rodney a little reluctantly, jogging back to the gateroom and up to Woolsey’s office, where he gets a sympathetic glance from Woolsey and an amused look from Lorne. He later learns that Teyla said he had to pop to the bathroom and when he took a while she’d improvised something about the food disagreeing with him. Lovely. The rest of the day is all debriefs and writing up reports and checking in with the base, making sure he’s up to speed after being away a week. Nothing exciting, some problem with knitting needles that has been dealt with. The following day he’s in Rodney’s lab, half-deciding that Rodney’s right to be pissy about the parade taking away his people; hardly anyone’s there working. That might be due to Rodney’s sour mood. John lets the bad temper roll off his back and gets on with his work until Yamato discovers him. 

“Sir,” Yamato says, sliding in and sitting across the counter-top John’s using as a desk. It has burn marks on it, which is pretty cool. Nicer than his stuffy office. 

“Go ahead, sergeant,” John says, idly, watching Rodney’s shoulders as he writes on a board muttering to himself. “Hm.”

“Uh, ok,” Yamato says. “This festival thing.”

“Uh huh?” John says, tilting his head a bit so he can get a better angle. Rodney’s shirt is just a little too small, every time he gets frustrated and gestures wildly with his marker, a little bit of skin gets revealed. Nice. 

“I don’t know how it worked back home, but we’ve been thinking, and we thought it’d be good to invite someone to lead the parade,” Yamato says. John absently translates that to ‘we had a big fight about who gets to go in front’. “We thought maybe you’d do it, sir.”

“Sure,” John agrees, smiling as Rodney stretches. He looks really warm and John’s been away an entire week. They had last night, but still. Long time. There’s something about the way Rodney’s hair sticks up from running frustrated hands through it that’s just endearing, and even grumpy and radiating irritation, well, John sort of finds him beautiful. Yamato says something about lanterns and John nods. “Yes, sergeant, that sounds appropriate.”

“Really?”

“Yeah,” John says. Rodney’s writing again, bending to reach lower on the board. 

“I didn’t think you’d want to, that’s fantastic! I’m sure Katherine will help you, she’s real great. Ronon has some awesome ideas about what to build, it’ll have to be simple of course there’s not much time, but I’m sure you can make something,” Yamato says. “Thanks for doing this, we do have some basic square lanterns for anyone joining who hasn’t made anything, but it’d be good to have something better up front.”

“Huh?” John says, attention returning to the very enthusiastic Yamato. “A what now?”

“Your lantern. Thanks for agreeing to make one, it’ll be great. Thank you, sir!” 

With that bombshell, Yamato leaves in a rush. John watches him go, gaping. When he turns back to Rodney, he’s got his back to the board and his arms cross, one eyebrow raised. He looks like he’s fighting amusement. 

“Why in hell did you just agree to lead the stupid parade  _ and  _ to make a ‘cool lantern’?” Rodney asks. 

“Is that what I agreed to?” John says, biting his lip. “Oops.”

Rodney makes a smug sound, and stretches pointedly. John decides that if Rodney’s people aren’t working and his marines are busy doing lantern stuff, they might as well not be at work either. He doesn’t return to the lanterns issue until the next day. Making a lantern, it turns out, is quite hard. ‘Katherine’ is one of the engineers and she is, as-advertised, very good at making lanterns. She is also very distracted by Yamato, who keeps on not-quite managing to ask her out. It’s incredibly annoying. John ditches them and finds a round-ish lantern, smacks on a black bat silhouette, and calls it a job done.

“What is it?” Lorne asks, hands on hips, surveying it critically. 

“Bat signal,” John says. “Very cool. This is glue and paper, isn’t it just gonna catch fire?”

“We’re using torches, sir,” Lorne says, still examining John’s handiwork. 

“It’s fine,” John says, giving Lorne a light push. “Leave my lantern alone.”

The fight over who leads the parade must have been pretty bad; John’s lantern gets an okay. The Lantean planet (designation PK5-338, breathable atmosphere, smaller ocean than previous) has had fairly clement weather so far, but the day before the lantern thing the sky goes dark and it starts to rain and doesn’t stop. The meteorologists say that it’s just rain and there’s no danger, but it’s gloomy and John remembers the long dark of MK3-000 without any fondness. He heads to Rodney’s quarters after work and tucks himself in against Rodney’s side where he’s sat on the bed working. 

“Mm?” Rodney asks. 

“It’s dark, I’m cold and damp,” John complains. 

Rodney makes a vaguely affirmative noise and gives John’s knee a pat, continuing with whatever he’s doing on the laptop. John dozes, finding that he’s tireder than he thought. They got word from Carson that the work to help the Hoff sufferers is going well but he’s discovered a few planets with a different plague, probably unrelated but comorbid with the Hoffan thing. He’d sounded exhausted and the whole thing sounded bad. Woolsey had no resources to allocate, the IOA having limited his powers, and John hasn’t got much either so they’ve spent the day trying to work that out. 

“Going off-world again, day after tomorrow,” John mumbles, when Rodney switches from work to emails (John can tell when the grumbling goes from vitriolic to fond, something about Jeannie). 

“Carson’s thing?” Rodney says. 

“Yeah. I think it might be worth rigging together a team to help identify Pegasus-based resources that Carson’s teams can use,” John says. 

“He’s set up quite a wide network of people doing humanitarian work,” Rodney says, sounding almost like he admires it. “Can I come?”

“Might not see Carson,” John says. Then, because they probably will make time to stop by the base-camp Carson’s set up, “yeah, I’ll just assign AR-1 to it, at first. We’ll see who Dr Gush can spare, maybe someone from your department? I think Holt would be a good team-lead and we’ve got her for another six months before her tour here’s over. She’s too useful to keep her just running training. Two of the planets affected have long winters, I could set her up somewhere there, sell it to the SGC that way, some sort of training.”

Rodney hums in agreement, then starts to read out bits of his latest batch of emails from Jeannie. John closes his eyes and listens to the cadence of Rodney’s voice against the rain. 

It’s still raining in the morning, and it rains all day. There are mutters in training and whenever he passes people in the corridors about the whole thing before called off, and in the afternoon the rain turns hard and heavy, pouring from the sky. Then, it stops. Clears up just like that, leaving only cold, dim half-light of evening. John hasn’t been in on the organising of the lantern parade thing, he feels like he’s getting a really authentic experience when he can’t find the starting place, the people involved, or his batman lantern. Finally Lorne finds  _ him _ , dragging him out to the South-East pier. 

III

John waits at the top of the pier, holding tight to the sticks of his lantern, shivering in the cooling evening as it gets darker and darker. His lantern’s lit, and behind him there’s a shifting, growing, shimmering crowd of lights, bobbing about and casting strange shadows. Miles Ladipo is behind him, humming and bouncing excitedly along to the band of brass instruments playing something suitably up-beat. Behind that, further along the pier, John can hear other music, a little slower, violins as well. Even further away is yet another bunch of musicians. It should be discordant, but it’s just strange. There’s a fog lingering, everyone’s in a mixture of uniform and civilian clothes, some in ABUs or BDUs and some in the Atlantis uniform and some in Athosian cloths, some sporting clothing they’ve bartered for, all kinds. Someone’s singing, there’s a drum beat, people are chatting. John waits, listening to Rodney complain on radio; Rodney’s in the lab, trying to get work done. 

“C’mon, McKay,” John says, turning away from everyone.

“Oh, Sheppard, hi,” Rodney says, as if he doesn’t know he’s been complaining for hours on the channel that’s just them. 

“Just stand on a balcony somewhere and watch me carry this lantern, ok?” John says. 

“Fine,” Rodney says. “Where do I go?”

“You know, I haven’t the foggiest idea,” John says, and laughs, setting off another ream of complaints. 

He turns his radio off as Yamato comes bustling up the line. He thanks John again before settling in behind with Ladipo, this whole thing seems to have been their joint effort. John asks about the route but gets a chuckle in reply and a ‘wherever you want to go, sir’. He grins and sets off at an even pace, thinking about Commander Vimes of the Ankh Morpork city watch. He swings his leg, lets his boot fall, the watchman’s walk. He heads toward the centre of Atlantis, his discordant troops muffled sometimes by fog, sometimes clear as a bell. 

The city’s lights have been dimmed, the corridors are quieter than usual, no one busting or hurrying. They pass people in huddles, leaning on walls, waiting for them. People have drinks, some, and some have snacks. There are people sat on walkways with their legs dangling, people waving at their friends. Some fall in to walk with people they know, someone new starts singing with the band furthest forward, slower, weaving in between the more steady marching beat of the song, oddly haunting. People quiet as they pass, watching, the lights dimming further or rising, inconsistent. It’s disquieting, the eerie feel as they come, but they bring light and it feels like walking in a bubble of warmth, casting the golden torch-light around them, music brightening the quiet. 

John heads ever-inward, people drifting in and out of the parade. People are chatting, still, and the music changes, coming now stronger now fainter as musicians leave or arrive, as the distance grows or shrinks between the lantern bearers, as people stop playing to talk. It’s ever-shifting, like something alive. John walks his city. He knows the route he’s picking out, he knows the hallways, knows the twists and turns. He knows to climb the stairs here so they’ll be on the middle walkway, light fluttering into the greater darkness of high ceilings and distant walls, the soft clank of boots echoing. He knows to turn left even though it feels like that’s the long way around, because going right you have to take a transporter. He knows to take a detour to avoid damaged areas. He climbs them higher. 

He takes them through the recreation area, rooms designated as communal places to relax, to use for groups, movie nights, whatever. They find Teyla there with Torren, she walks with John, singing something as the music muffles further down the line, Torren singing along. Something simple made beautiful by her voice, her hand on his arm, smiling at how awed Torren is by the light and the music. Ronon pushes through to the front with his ipek, huge and regal and swimming gracefully over them like a protector. Torren loves the ipek. They don’t find Rodney until they’re almost in the gateroom. He’s dragged a kitchen chair from somewhere, one of the fold-up ones from Earth. John didn’t even know they had those on Atlantis. He finds a fond, dopey smile spreading over his face and can’t stop it. Rodney’s face is beautiful in the lantern light; he looks so surprised and he’s gaping at them as they come. 

“Oh my god,” he mutters, scrambling up and hurrying across, walking backwards to look over John’s shoulder. “What the hell have you summoned?”

“Light,” John says, and Rodney harumphs and turns, walking beside John, arms crossed. His lips are twitching and he’s happy, John can tell. And impressed. John nudges him with an elbow. “How weird is this? Cool, huh?”

“Weird for sure, cool…” Rodney tails off, John’s elbow sharper this time. “Ok, yeah. This is… ‘cool’.”

John checks around. No one’s paying them attention, so he takes Rodney’s hand for a moment, closing his eyes. The whole parade slows, time ticking on a slower beat, John’s footsteps faltering. Then Rodney’s giving his fingers a gentle squeeze and letting go, and everything solidifies. The gateroom’s up ahead, fuller than the corridors with spectators, waiting with cameras and mulled wine and songs. John takes them on a loop of the room, up the stairs, and then down for another loop. Music strikes up louder and more cheerful and more discordant, the lights are higher, people’s chat is louder, and then they’re heading out again and the world fades back to dimness. 

As they walk back to the pier, people wander off, spectators falling away again. Teyla heads off near the living quarters, taking Torren to bed. Rodney didn’t stay for even one loop of the gateroom, already hurrying off for more work. John and Ronon walk together the whole way, until it’s just the lantern bearers, until the music quiets, until they’re moving back through the fog and mists toward their starting point. Until it’s just the shuffle of feet, the sound of people breathing, the torchlight against the now-dark night. Until they’re still, standing with their lights, silent. 

John turns, surveys his people who came across two galaxies, gave up lives and friends and family. People who want to know, who want to explore and live and experience everything they possibly can. He has nothing to say, so he just turns off the torch, and watches as everyone follows suit, a wave of darkness spreading out from his central point, warm and welcoming after the surreal light. He stands, shivering as the cold and damp set in and night falls for real. There’s a shuffling and uncertainty, everyone unsure what to do next. There’s just the empty night, now. And then, like a miracle, there’s a whine and a quiet popping and fizzling sound, and the sky fills with bursts of coloured light; Lorne’s fireworks. Someone’s made them, out here in Pegasus, without the explosions. Just the hiss and sputter, crackles like a wood fire. 

Later, they return to the city, toting their lanterns that look bedraggled by now. Everyone goes their own way, to the mess or their rooms or back to duties. John has work to do, some paperwork to catch up on and a debrief with one of his lieutenants, even though it’s late. He goes to the mess afterwards and finds Rodney, sitting with him while Rodney works, eating his way through what was left for dinner. Rodney grumbles about rotas and catching up on work now that’s over with. After about half an hour he turns slightly to John and rubs his arm, smile crooked, and says he liked John’s lantern. It makes John feel weird and warm and awkward so he just nods and gets on with his food, though his plate’s nearly empty. 

“Come on, I’ll walk you home,” Rodney says, voice edged with sarcasm but expression soft and hopeful like he might secretly mean it. 

They walk as they usually do, shoulders brushing, bickering about Batman movies and Terry Pratchett books. They go to Rodney’s quarters because he has a bed big enough for them to both fit on, just about. They curl together, listening as it begins to rain again, light pooling around them. 

**Author's Note:**

> Oxford really does have this baffling lights festival and last time I went Hertford was indeed doing carols and selling mulled wine. It isn't a very old tradition, maybe five six years? so it isn't old enough to be around when Yamato was a child like in the fic (Yamato is a sergeant named in like episode three, idk, I needed a human being and he was fine and handy). The rabbit hangs in the covered market, like he says, the rest of the year. 
> 
> And it really is odd and eerie, that really is how it goes - rushing place to place, everyone you pass ther'es a certain look, and there's the exchange of 'have they been through here? did you see? did we miss them?' and then they truly do just seem to rise right out of the cobbles. It's utterly bizarre
> 
> cheese rolling is also a real thing, I've never done it, it's a steep af hill in gloucestershite (the county I grew up in) and you roll a cheese down the hill and everyone runs hell for leather after it, the winner gets the cheese.


End file.
